[Fill-In-The-Blank] Enterprise Architecture

Sifting through the enterprise architecture blogosphere of late, one finds a number of commentators advocating EA with an array of qualifiers in front of the term "Enterprise Architecture." As examples, we have "user-centric," "practical", and "pragmatic" enterprise architecture connoting that the qualifier in front of "enterprise architecture" denotes a greater level of goodness or completeness than if the qualifer were not present. Before I continue, let me state on the record that all three of the blogs that I just referenced above contain posts that are well thought-out and written even if I don't agree with everything they espouse (and I do agree with the majority of the insights they present).

Call me a nit-picker if you must, but putting limiting or obvious qualifiers in front of a term like enterprise architecture doesn't really add much to describing a discipline that is already ambiguous in its own right. Also, some qualifiers can bring about unintended consequences from those who are confused or feel that their interests or goals are not adequately represented or accounted for.

Let's take user-centric enterprise architecture as an example, since I don't think that any of us walk around our respective organizations all day espousing the concepts of "impractical" or "dogmatic" EA...:) On the surface, why wouldn't we all want user-centricity? It makes people feel like meeting their needs is the top priority of the IT architecture, and that's certainly a noble and worthy goal. However, if that's all that there is to this concept or "non-users" are not being taken into account in this approach, there will be massive amounts of trouble. Consider:

• Enterprises typically have thousands of users, and a lot of their operational systems provide services for and to these hordes. It is impossible to gain consensus from such a massive body, much less design and deploy a "centric" architecture around them.
• A substantial portion of operational systems within the enterprise run independently from users. These systems are definitely a part of the enterprise architecture, so how exactly is user-centric enterprise architecture addressing these systems and the issues they bring to the table?
• As good as the terms "user-centric," people-oriented," and "people over process" sound in their respective altruistic intents, the fact of the matter in large enterprises is that the organization and its processes outlast everybody, regardless of who they are. A "user-centric" architecture must deal with the fact that the "users" (and their respective and divergent viewpoints) are going to get swapped out - often. And far more often than the processes the organization uses to conduct its affairs.

Enterprise architects already have huge issues serving and maintaining relationships with various constituencies both within IT and the business. Attempts to further qualify EA such as I've described above usually serve to skew the messages we're trying to send to these constituencies, and most often in a negative way with respect to work products and eventual outcomes.

There is one more term used to qualify EA and lots of other IT and business issues that needs to be addressed in a similar manner: agility. However, that deserves a post all its own and it will be coming later on this week.

Comments

[Mike Walker]

I totally agree with what you are saying here. Adding one more adj. in front of EA just confuses people.

In enterprises the goal should be to keep it simple. However, talking with other EA's I will like to qualify my approach to EA, such as as "pragamtic" or "real-world". This is describing how I go about EA and not a new definition of what it is.

[Adrian Campbell]

Thre is also a problem with people adding the word 'enterprise' in front of words where it is not appropriate. Many job adverts for instance, add the prefix 'enterprise' to oversell job titles that are clearly only at the project level and not at the corporate/strategic level that the word 'enterprise' implies.

[Andy Blumenthal]

User-centric EA is not just the opposite of "impractical" EA. User-centric EA is a holistic focus on developing useful and usable information products and governance services to the end users in the enterprise. The users in 'traditional' EA have been overlooked far too long. If you've ever seen the incomprehensible shelf-ware from these EA efforts, you will certainly know what I mean. Thanks for mentioning my post. -Andy (usercentric EA.blogspot.com)